Episode 3 Ultimate Brain

Pop goes the Guinea Pig, up to 200 times a minute.

How can you hide a handsome monkey using only liquid nitrogen

and hot water?

And will the 4 O'Clock Club achieve full marks for a change?

You'll need to run your brain at full power to be the Ultimate Brain!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Welcome to Ultimate Brain!

I am on a quest to seek out the sharpest tools in the box.

Yes, great, pulsing brains,

steaming and bubbling over with knowledge and intelligence.

For I...

-ECHOING:

-..am Dr Brain!

These people over here think they're some pretty clever cookies

and they will be battling it out for the ultimate prize - honour.

Let's find out who they are. Beginning with the Green Team!

Our first team are Rhodri, Megan and Alex,

otherwise known as the Green Machines!

Let's see if their brains are running like clockwork.

-Hi, Greens!

-Hello.

-Where are you from?

-ALL:

-Swansea.

-Swansea? That's in Wales, right?

-Yes.

Lovely place. What's the cleverest thing you've ever done?

Be on this show.

"Be on this show" is a great answer.

Ladies and gentlemen, the Green Machine!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Our next team, Lidia, Imogen and Erin, have called themselves

the Yellow Experimenters.

Let's hope their method leads them to the right conclusions.

-Where are you from?

-Birmingham.

Birmingham! Ah, I like Birmingham. Dr Lidia, are you at all sporty?

-Yeah.

-Yes! I thought so. What do you do?

-Netball.

Netball. Anything else?

-Basketball.

-Oh, I'm an expert at basketball....

Dddddrrrrppp! Swoooosh!

-Anything else?

-Gymnastics.

Gymnastics? Oh, yes, I'm brilliant at that.

Aah!

-Is there a sport you don't play?

-Hockey.

Hockey! She doesn't like hockey.

I don't like hockey - who'd want to play hockey?

Well done, you lot! That's the Yellow Team!

Our final team are the Four O'Clock Blues.

Ruby, Khalil and Akai from CBBC's hugely popular Four O'Clock Club.

Can they surprise us all and go to the top of the class?

Now, these people are usually held back in detention, of course.

Are you going to be held back today?

Or are you going to surge forward to victory?

Obviously we're going to surge forward to victory.

Now, I've heard, Mr Akai, you're a pretty hot dancer, right?

Yeah, I'm decent, yeah, yeah.

-Going to prove it?

-Right now?

-Yes!

-OK.

Come on! Everybody, let's see Akai busting some moves.

Some music, please!

ELECTRONIC MUSIC PLAYS

Thank you!

Thank you, Akai! Wonderful!

Well, now all of you, throughout

this show you've got to try to impress me with your brain skills,

your intuition and your intelligence.

But above all...

-COCKNEY ACCENT:

-Don't be a muppet, do you know what I mean?

Time to stoke up your thinking irons with a nice simple question.

Look what I have here.

I have two flasks of liquid nitrogen.

One of the coldest things on the Earth.

Colder than the North Pole and the South Pole put together.

It's close to minus 200 degrees.

TEETH CHATTERING

That's cold.

In contrast, in here I have some boiling water, which is roughly

round about 100 degrees Centigrade.

So, what's going to happen when I add the two liquids together?

Some sort of reaction, I shouldn't doubt. What do we think?

So the options are...

What do you think? Have a little chat...now!

Ah, now, the teams' brains are working hard here,

considering the possibilities.

Or are they talking about what they're going to have for tea?

OK, teams, I think you've had enough time to think -

let's see your answers...now!

'Oooh! Each team has gone for a different answer.

'Four O'Clock Blues have gone for A, the water freezes instantly.

'The Green Machines have B, the liquid nitrogen boils into a gas.

'And the Yellow Experimenters have gone for D, something else.

'What about poor old C?'

We don't think it's going to freeze straight away,

we think that it's going to take a few more seconds

and it's just going to cool down instead of freezing.

Aah! So you think that the coldness of the liquid nitrogen is going

to cause the boiling water to just sort of cool down

-but not quite so far as freezing?

-They're wrong.

Aahhh, I see. Oh, they're wrong, are they, Dr Khalil? They're wrong?

Come on, then, why?

-Well, you see the liquid nitrogen, as you said...

-Yes.

-..is minus 200 degrees, right?

-Yes.

-And the water, you said, is around 100 degrees.

-That's right.

If water's freezing point is 0 degrees,

then minus 100 degrees would like, it would go to that straight away,

so it wouldn't gradually go.

Thinking mathematically, I like that, Blue Team.

That's very, very good.

The Green Machines, you've gone for B. Now, what makes you think that?

-Because steam's a gas, because it rises up with the particles.

-Yes.

And so liquid nitrogen,

-if it will go in, we think it might rise up with the steam.

-Ah!

So you think it's going to go in there

and the steam of the water is going to push the liquid nitrogen

upwards, so that's going to cause it to boil with the steam.

-Is that, is that what you're saying?

-Yeah.

What a fascinating answer that is.

There's only one way to find out if it's true - let's try it!

Here goes science...

I deem this experiment to be...

A SUCCESS!

So there we go, what happens?

-It turned into gas.

-It turned into a gas, steam, and it....

-It boiled, didn't it?

-Yeah.

The liquid nitrogen boiled, it turned into a gas.

Which means the correct answer was B.

And here's the reason why.

The liquid nitrogen is only just below its boiling point,

which is minus 196 degrees Celsius.

Whereas the water is at around 100 degrees Celsius,

which is way above its freezing point.

So the nitrogen quickly boils off into a burst of gas before

the water has had a chance to cool down enough to freeze, do you see?

Do you see? Do you?

Which means ten points go to the Green Machines!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Challenge number two! The creative challenge!

Time now to use a different part of the brain. Behold!

Now, I don't know about you, but I've always wondered,

ever since I was a little, tiny baby monkey, whether or not you could

burst this amount of balloons inside one minute.

So I gave our contestants three days and a budget of £50

to see if they can work out if it's possible.

But who's going to be in charge of popping all these balloons?

Well, I had a little think about that and I thought, why not

pick somebody who has a deep psychological fear of loud noises?

MUSIC: "What Makes You Beautiful" by One Direction

Yes! It's my good friend, my pet, Mr Guinea Pig!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

You know how I feel about balloons.

I do. They worry you, don't they?

They really do.

-They make you scared, don't they?

-Almost as scared as your face, yeah.

Yes, yes, yes, and do you know what?

There's nothing that makes me laugh

more than seeing you frightened and injured. So!

Now, we need to know what's going to be the first plan of how

you are going to pop all these balloons.

So let us ask the Blue Team!

The Four O'Clock Blues, Ruby, Khalil and Akai.

Khalil won a BAFTA for his

performance in The Four O'Clock Club.

Will his team's idea for this challenge be just as award-winning?

Now, Dr Ruby, can you talk me through this contraption?

What do all the parts do?

-OK, so it's inspired by a crab.

-Oh, yes.

Hence the pincers, they're supposed to be pincers.

I see, these are pincers.

What seaside have you been to and seen crabs that look like this?

It resembles a crab to me.

OK, and then we have the cone, which has pins in it.

Oh, and it's a Hoover as well,

so like, it pulls it in and then it, what's it called? It pierces it.

-I see.

-And you expect that to work?

Yeah, it's going to work, we're clever, we're doctors.

You're doctors? You're real doctors, are you?

Yeah, I done my doctorate in... balloon science.

In balloon science? OK.

The Four O'Clock Blues hope that their crab-like,

vacuum-powered balloon destroyer will suck up the balloons

at an enormous rate and swiftly despatch them to balloon heaven.

Sounds potty to me, but will it work?

-Are we ready to count him in?

-Yeah, yeah.

-Here we go.

-Let's go.

ALL: Three! Two! One!

Good luck, Guinea Pig! Off you go!

No balloons so far. That's a score of nil. Still nothing.

-That's it, now it's working.

-Yes! Yes!

Oh! And he's broken it!

Oh, Guinea Pig, you've got to keep going, keep going, come on!

That's it, you've only got about another 150 to go.

Keep going! Come on!

Two!

Oh, that's it, then, time up, time up, I'm afraid.

Ah, unlucky with that, really put some effort in there.

-Well, it sort of worked quite well, didn't it? At points.

-Yep.

-What do you think went wrong?

-The Guinea Pig's efforts were shocking.

-Yeah.

-You think so?

-You ought to be ashamed of yourself, mate.

That's because your crab is shocking! That's why!

-It did fall off, so...

-You're blaming him, he's blaming you.

Yeah, it did fall off, but a good workman never blames his tools.

-I'm blaming YOUR tools!

-That is true.

It's not my tools, I wouldn't have made this ridiculous space crab.

Listen, we had £50, all right? Times are hard.

So are you disappointed that it didn't work?

Well, it did work, we saw it pop the balloons.

I don't know if you remember,

the objective was 200 balloons in 60 seconds.

-Let's count how many are left...

-GIBBERISH

LOADS!

Yeah, at the end of the day it's the effort that counts, innit?

If you had made more effort,

perhaps I would have been able to do all of them.

Unfortunately, at the end of the day, it's winning that counts,

and you didn't.

You got it wrong, I'm afraid, so no points for the Blue Team.

Wow!

Let's see how the Greens get on.

The Green Machines - Rhodri, Megan and Alex.

Three of Swansea's finest young minds.

Rhodri enjoys fencing in his spare time -

I wonder if he fancies coming round to fix my fence?

Come on!

What, pray, is the name of your plan?

ALL: Operation Buzz Buzz.

Operation Buzz Buzz? And could that be because he looks like a bee?

Yeah, completely.

Ah, there you see, I'm clever, I'm a scientist, you see?

Now, explain to me how this is going to work.

I can't see any sort of popping material, will you show me?

The pins are, like, all over the chest.

Oh, I see, yes, there's little pins there, aren't there?

Yes. Come on! Anybody want to high-five him?

Uh, no, I don't think so, because look, more pins.

Ooh, ahh, yes, more pins, you see.

I'm covered in sharp needles

-and I've got to dive into balloons that make very loud noises?

-Yeah!

Basically yes, yes.

-Enjoy!

-Your favourite hobby.

It's called confronting your fears. You feel happy?

-Why don't you do it?

-Because you're the Guinea Pig.

Operation Buzz Buzz.

A square prickly bee on a mission - is this a more efficient way

of quickly popping all those balloons in 60 seconds?

Or will there be a sting in the tale?

Do you get it? Sting?

-Hey! Blues and Yellows, do you think this is going to work?

-No!

No! Why not?

Cheers, guys!

Because it's rubbish!

Because it's rubbish, they say. Let's have a go!

So are you ready?

-I'm never ready.

-Are you ready?

-Yes!

60 seconds on the clock, starting from now!

There's one, there's another.

Ooh, it's working quite well, it's working quite well.

Keep going! You can do it!

You need to get those balloons.

Come on! Jump, jump around!

Jump on that one! Don't stop!

Five seconds left.

Jump, jump! Jump over there!

Oh, that's your time up!

I can't help feeling that

if he'd done that dive from the beginning he might have done better.

-Yeah!

-But you did quite well, didn't you? Looking at it.

How do you feel about how that went?

I think that went very, very well.

We did better than the Blues.

Yeah, but you didn't get 200.

You didn't get 200, you got 0 points technically.

We still did better than you.

Now, let's see how many balloons were left...

GIBBERISH

Remembering that the Blue Team had loads left. There are quite a few,

so I think you've done slightly better than the Blues.

But will that be enough to secure the points?

Will the Yellows do any better? Hey! Let's find out!

Lidia, Imogen and Erin the girl power behind the

Yellow Experimenters.

Erin once decided to make four big cakes in a week,

that's my kind of experiment.

That's just a snack for me.

For the Yellows this is your chance to steal the ten points.

-Are you confident?

-Yes, of course.

What is the name of your plan?

The Balloon-tastic-popper.

It involves something quite scary-looking.

-What is that. please?

-Fire.

-Fire! A blowtorch, is it? Am I right in thinking?

-Yeah.

So how's this going to work?

Well, it's just going to pop all the balloons.

It's just going to burn them all?

It's going to disintegrate them.

I see. Disintegrate them? Oh, very good, how do you feel about that?

Now, you're giving me more sharp pins, but this time with fire.

How much more dangerous do you want to make this for me?

The Balloon-tastic popper!

A blowtorch with extra pins for use in the event of flame loss.

Will this son of Smaug burn the opposition to a crisp?

Pins and fire, what a wonderful combination.

Now, I should just say that if you at home were thinking at any point

of using a blowtorch to set fire to 200 balloons -

DON'T!

Now, then, shall we count him in? Are you ready?

-Yeah.

-60 seconds on the clock. What do you think, Greens and Blues?

-Is this going to work?

-No!

-No?

-Yes, it will.

-Let's try it, here we go!

Three! Two! One! Go!

Go on, Guinea Pig! There's one, there's two! Is it working?

Looking worried, Blue and Green teams.

-Oh, no!

-Oh, no, the gas has gone out, you've got to carry on,

you've got to carry on!

It's just a setback.

Do that! Do that!

Only one second left! Oh, and that's your time up!

That is your time up. Well, how do we think that went?

Good! All right!

Guinea Pig, how was it?

Whoo! Well, I had a pop at it!

You had a pop at it! Very good! Shut up.

How do you think it went?

I think it went quite well considering the gas turned off.

So now I can reveal the exact numbers of who popped what!

In third place...

the Four O'Clock Blues with 21 balloons popped.

Not bad, well done.

In second place...

..the Green Machine with 86 balloons popped. Well done.

And, in first place, that means the Yellow Experimenters

who popped 105 balloons. So it's ten points for the Yellows!

Well done! Well done!

How do you feel?

-Awesome!

-Awesome!

So at the end of that round,

the Green Machines and the Yellow Experimenters

are both in the lead with ten honour points each,

while the 4 O'Clock Blues are at the bottom of the class again!

Oh, dearie me.

Let's see what happens next!

Now it's time for our teams to act on instinct.

It's the Brainless Challenge.

"I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells" - Dr Seuss.

Yes, and it's time now to wake up the bonkers part of the brain.

The part of the brain known as the...

-AWOOGA!

-..segment.

So this game is called Egg Boxing. And I'll tell you why.

One member of each team

will be feeding another member of their team eggs.

They will be carrying it over to another member of their team,

who will be storing the eggs.

The only complication is that this member of the team

has to carry the eggs using...

-DRUM ROLL

-Boxing gloves!

Give us a couple of shots, come on! Come on!

That's it! That's it! Yeah, right, left! Right, left, left!

Good shots there you see.

So, now, the first one to get all their eggs from the box

into the pot wins the game and gets ten points, are you ready?

-Yeah.

-Your time starts...now!

Here we go! Here we go! Oh, look.

Rhodri is already off, very gently, that's it, lovely.

The Blues are a little behind, oh,

but they're going for a sort of bulk move.

They're trying to get them all in, in one go.

Quick, quick, quick! Quick, quick, quick!

They're with five this time. He's got five.

All of them! All of them! All of them! Come on!

-Come on!

-Remember, don't break any eggs, because they won't count.

Don't drop any.

And remember it's the first team to get all of their eggs.

And the Yellows are doing very well.

Done!

Done! The Blues have done it, well done the Blue Team!

Well done, come back to your places, please.

So now I'm going to check because of course any broken ones won't count.

Let's check them using my monkey nose. No, none there.

No, that's pretty good. Wait a minute.

Wait a minute! What's that?!

A broken egg.

It's a broken egg and I'm afraid that means it doesn't count.

That means that the Yellow Team are the winners, well done, Yellows!

Ten points to you.

So The Yellow Experimenters successfully put all

their eggs into one basket, moving them into the lead with 20 points!

Light bulbs + brain = inspiration!

It's time for our next round.

-ECHOING:

-Behold...

..some cups. A tower of cups and a table of props.

Cups, props, props, cups, cups, props, props cups, cups,

cups, prop, prop, props.

Now, teams, what you've got to do is devise a way to knock over

this tower of cups.

Looks pretty easy, doesn't it?

They're flimsy, they're just made out of paper.

And you have here a whole table full of props such as string, tape,

more tape, an eggy thing, my mother's nose,

a banana, scissors, cardboard,

paper, everything. All sorts of things.

Now, you've got to think of a way to knock over these cups

and you have to remain behind this line.

I'm going to give you now a few moments to think about your answers

and then we're going to try them.

Your thinking time starts now.

THEY CONFER

So, the teams have to come up with a plan to knock over

as many cups as possible using the props available,

like that one I'm sniffing there, very nice!

And without crossing the line.

PRETENDS TO PLAY FLUTE

Time is up! Time to stop thinking and let's see your answers.

Let's have a look.

Ooh, some intriguing-looking things going on there.

Very good. Well, let's start with the Yellow Experimenters.

In this one the egg is covered with materials and the bike pump goes

right through it and then the bananas go on the sides.

Well, let's see if it works - come on down!

This is real science at work.

The Whoopsie-Daisy 800, built for one purpose. Teaching cups a lesson.

I can see that Dr Imogen is holding it like this, so you're

hoping that this is going to knock out the bottom row, is that right?

-Yep.

-Yeah.

-Well, let's see if it works. In three, two, one, fire!

Oh, unlucky!

Oh, no. What a shame.

Very, very unlucky.

Didn't quite work, unfortunately.

Let's see it again in slow motion, here she goes.

Yeah, oh, look at me, I'm handsome, aren't I? What a handsome monkey.

Lovely. Who's that?

It was a nice, heavy implement that you slung with brutal force

at the cups but, unfortunately,

the aim was a little bit wrong which means no points, I'm afraid.

But, good effort for trying.

What a shame.

Well done. Unlucky, there, the Yellows.

OK, now, it's time for my friends 4 O'Clock Blues.

# It's four o'clock and I've got the blues. #

What's your plan? Let's see it.

Three giant arrows.

Which you're going to throw at a wedding cake. I like it.

Explain, please, Dr Ruby.

-Two bananas attached with string.

-Yes, attached to...?

-Attached with string. No, no, tape.

-Together. Oh, with tape.

-Yep.

-And then we're just going to throw them at the cups.

-I see.

You're going to tie two bananas together and just throw them

at the cups.

Is there, by any chance, any sort of science involved in this?

Or are you just thinking about just throwing bananas?

The Banana Hawk 6,000.

The mother of all banana-based cup-destroying...thingies..

Ah, these are on a diagonal... Oh, my.

Don't make it complicated, you're throwing bananas at cups.

He's worried.

Three! Two! One! Fire in the hole!

Yes. That's all right, that's good, that's good.

Not bad, not bad. That's not bad, there were a few cups remaining.

Oh, here we see it again in slow motion.

Flies across the screen, BANG, look at that. Oh, not quite, though.

Not too bad. Now!

Let's find out whether the Greens have a more elegant

and scientific solution.

So, Greens, let's see your plan.

So, we got this banana, we're going to put cardboard around it and then

tape that around and then we're just going to lob it at the cups.

Oh, so once again deploying banana brutality at the cups

in the hope that they're going to come tumbling down.

Yes, that is what we're doing.

Banana is there in the card.

I'm so tense!

Cup Over Mark 1. Precision engineered, paper, fruit and tape.

Shock and awe. And fruit and tape. And paper.

Are you confident?

A little bit.

Let's try it, then. Three! Two! One! Fire!

-Yay!

-Yes!

-Yes!

-Only one remaining, that is the best shot so far.

-Are you pleased with that?

-Yes.

Yeah! Dancing, dancing!

Victory dance!

Victory dance!

Let's see it in slow motion. Whoosh, and down it comes.

And boom! Down it comes again. She got it twice.

Ten points to the Greens. Put it there, good work.

This is how Dr Brain, the monkey scientist, would do it.

Now, you'll need an ordinary cardboard box,

reinforce the edges with tape to make it as airtight as possible

and cut a circular hole in one end -

get an adult or science monkey to help you.

For ultimate power, replace the cardboard at the back with

a large square of latex material.

If you can't find any, don't worry,

just press the sides of the box to fire it instead.

Now, pull back on the latex and fire!

Now, because air is invisible,

in order to help you see the movement, I've added some smoke!

Look at that! Smoking!

Boom! Down she comes. Who's that handsome devil?

And so, as we enter the final round, the scores couldn't be any closer.

It's getting so tense I think I'm going to cry.

So now, all you have to do is answer questions on all subjects.

You get two points per right answer. Are you ready?

BLUE TEAM BUZZER

-Yes.

-Good. Hands on brains, please.

Right, here we go. What does 1025 megabytes make?

BLUE TEAM BUZZER

A gigabyte.

Is correct.

Give me another name for a sphere beginning with B.

YELLOW TEAM BUZZER

-I didn't click it.

-Yes, you did.

Going to need an answer.

BLUE TEAM BUZZER

-A ball.

-A ball is the right answer, yes, yes, yes.

What's my uncle's name?

YELLOW TEAM BUZZER

-Bob. It's Bob.

-Yes.

How long does it take for light from the sun to reach the Earth?

BLUE TEAM BUZZER

Eight minutes.

Is the right answer.

What is the scientific name for water?

YELLOW TEAM BUZZER

-H20.

-Aqua.

-H20.

-Aqua.

H20. I will take that answer.

-What?! She said aqua!

-I said H20!

What is 75 times 2?

GREEN TEAM BUZZER

-150.

-Is the right answer. They were the only ones listening.

A 90-degree angle is also known as what kind of angle?

YELLOW TEAM BUZZER

-A right angle.

-A right angle is the right answer.

What animal is the word "canine" associated with?

GREEN TEAM BUZZER

-A dog.

-A dog is the right answer.

What is the word "spoons" backwards?

GREEN TEAM BUZZER

-Moops.

-Say again?

-Noops.

-The answer is "snoops".

That is the end of the round and that is the end of the game, folks.

Let me tell you the results of the game. The winner is...

-DRUM ROLL

-With the title of Ultimate Brain...

DRUM ROLL

Thank you, thank you. Yes, yes, yes. Give it up. With 26 points,

-it's the Yellow Experimenters!

-Yes!

Victor! Come, come, join me. Come, come, come.

Well done. Well done. The high-five of triumph.

Well done. The parade of victory.

Now, as the Guinea Pig garnishes you there,

can you tell me, what do you think was your secret? Why did you win?

-Because we're girls.

-It was obviously my amazing throw.

Because you're all girls and your amazing throwing.

Teamwork, was it?

You were the best, well done! You are...the Ultimate Brain!